If I Stay strikes boredom chord

I must admit, I asked myself the same question a few times as I watched the doe-eyed Chloe Grace Moretz wander aimlessly through this rather morbid teen romance. Of course, I did stay - right to the end - but I have to say it was a rather insipid experience with little drama and an absence of anything resembling an inspiring character.

Moretz plays 17-year-old Mia Hall, eldest daughter in a homely family of musicians-turned-cheesy good folk. There's ex-drummer dad (Joshua Leonard), ex-groupie mum (Mireille Enos) and little brother Teddy (Jakob Davies), who could have come straight from the set of The Brady Bunch. Cerebral and an obsessively talented cello player, Mia feels like she's the odd one out in the family, and when she starts dating Adam (Jamie Blackley), who is the lead guitarist in a fast-rising local rock band, she has trouble fitting into his world, too.

When a terrible car accident puts Mia and her family in hospital on the critical list, we witness Mia's out-of-body persona both following events at hospital and remembering her romance with Adam. Neither storyline is particularly absorbing - the teen dating plot following a well-established trajectory of make-up-break-up-repeat, and the hospital plot overly focused on following Moretz floating in white in various stages of bewilderment.

While Moretz is ethereal and highly watchable, there's little of any real substance for her - or any other of the cast - in the banal script that Shauna Cross has crafted from the young-adult novel by Gayle Forman. Watch out for young Brit talent Jamie Blackley - he certainly makes the most of his time on screen, even in the most cliched scenes.

Director R. J. Cutler maintains as much interest as possible by the crosscutting between plots, but really, there's no hiding dull slush, even when you throw in a few good songs and some classic cello.